“Where is your wife?” Alec asked. “Is she available to speak with us?”
“I don’t know. You’d have to ask her. Julie left me five years ago.” He sank lower in his chair. “Took Brenda with her. I haven’t seen either of them since.”
“Who’s Brenda?” Raegan asked, sensing they were about to lose Brent Coleman to a deep depression he’d yet to pull himself out of.
“Our older daughter.”
Raegan’s pulse sped up, and she glanced at Alec, saw he was thinking the same thing as her.
“How old is Brenda?” Alec asked.
“Gosh. She’d be in high school now.” A blank look filled his eyes. “I don’t even know what she looks like anymore.”
Heat spread across Raegan’s skin. Seven years ago, Brenda Coleman would have been close to the same age as Miguel Ramirez and Ginny Willig when their siblings went missing. The three families were definitely linked by more than just their caseworker.
“Do you remember a social worker by the name of Conner Murray?” Alec asked. “Five eight, pudgy, with thinning hair?”
Brent Coleman’s gaze narrowed as he thought back. “Yeah. He helped Brenda get set up with some social programs. Why?”
“We’re just checking into people who may have come into contact with different kids. Did he spend any time with Mary?”
“No.” Coleman shook his head. “I mean, I’m sure he saw her a few times when he was at the house, but his focus was on Brenda and getting her the services she qualified for.”
Alec nodded, but Coleman didn’t seem to notice. His gaze had drifted to the window, and a faraway look filled his eyes. “Some days I try to pretend like it didn’t happen, but it never works. Funny how one brief moment can change everything, isn’t it? I didn’t just lose Mary that day; I lost my whole family. If I had it to do over again . . .” His voice hitched, and he blinked several times before looking down at his hands. “Well, I’d do a lot of things different.”
Raegan’s heart squeezed tight, and as she stared at the broken man who’d lost everything, she couldn’t help but think of Alec alone in that farmhouse out in the country, different in a million ways from this but also eerily the same.
Her gaze drifted to the glass. Is this what Alec had done? Sat around drinking himself to death because he felt so guilty about losing Emma? Yes, she knew, because she’d watched him do it in their apartment before he’d left her. But he’d pulled himself out of it. He’d gotten help. He’d gone into rehab. He’d been sober now three years.
“I found him facedown on his kitchen table, an empty bottle of Jack near his left hand, and a loaded .45 near his right.” Ethan’s words the other night in her apartment echoed in her head, making her chest squeeze even tighter. “He swore he wasn’t trying to kill himself, but our parents weren’t convinced. They had him admitted to a rehab center. When he got out, he promised he wouldn’t drink again.”
He hadn’t gotten help on his own. He’d pulled himself out because he’d had people who wouldn’t let him wallow. People, she realized as she looked at his strong jaw and his blue eyes focused on Brent Coleman, who hadn’t given up on him, like she had.
Her heart stuttered as Alec pushed to his feet and held out his hand. “Thank you, Mr. Coleman. That’s all we need.”
“That’s it?”
Alec nodded. “Yeah. We won’t take any more of your time.”
Coleman’s gaze narrowed, and for the first time since they’d walked into his house, his eyes looked clear. “Why are you two so interested in my kid? In these other kids?”
Alec glanced once at Raegan as she stood, and before he even said the words, she knew what was going to come out. “Because our daughter went missing too. We’re trying to see if other cases in the area are linked to hers in any way.”
Coleman rose and glanced between them. “Your daughter? How long ago?”
“Three years,” Alec answered.
“You think she’s still alive?”
“Yes,” Alec said. “We hope, anyway.”
Raegan’s heart stuttered. Last night he’d said he’d wanted to believe. Today he was saying he had hope.
“I’ll pray you’re right,” Coleman said. “No one should go through what I have.”
Alec shook the man’s hand. Raegan said good-bye and moved toward the door, her head and heart spinning. Behind her, Alec and Brent Coleman exchanged quiet words on the porch, then seconds later Alec was beside her in the truck, starting the ignition and pulling away from the run-down property.
They needed to talk about the older siblings. Needed to figure out if the kids had possibly known each other. But all Raegan could focus on was what Alec had just admitted.
That he believed Emma was still alive.
She was just terrified to bring it up in case he hadn’t really meant it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Raegan made idle chitchat on the drive back into the city. Alec tried to pay attention but couldn’t do more than mutter “Uh huh” and “Yeah” because his brain was stuck on what Brent Coleman had said to him on the porch.
“Hold on to her. The biggest regret I have is wallowing in my own pain and not being there for my wife. I lost her same as I lost Mary. Difference is, losing Mary was an accident. Pushing Jules away wasn’t.”
That was him. He’d pushed Raegan away when he should have held on to her. Pushed her away when all she’d needed to do was lean on him.
Her cell phone buzzed as he pulled to a stop in front of her building. Darkness was just setting in, and the lights from outside shone over her face and the frown lines breaking across her bruised cheek as she gazed down at the screen.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, killing the engine.
“Nothing. It’s just the station. I haven’t checked in for a few days. I guess someone noticed.”
She hit “Answer” and pushed the car door open. “Yeah, this is Raegan.”
Unable to hear who she was talking to, Alec climbed out and moved around the car, waiting while Raegan keyed in the building code. When the door clicked, he pulled it open for her.
“Yes, sorry,” Raegan said. “Things have been a little crazy. I’m going to lose you on the elevator. Can I call you right back? Okay.”
She clicked “End” as they stepped onto the elevator.
“Who was that?” Alec asked.
“Anna Chapman. Jeremy’s on the warpath because I haven’t reported in.”
Jealousy rolled through his belly. A jealousy he didn’t have any right to feel, considering he’d been the one to leave her. “The boyfriend.”
“Ex-boyfriend.” She turned to look up at him as the elevator hummed. “And he wasn’t even really that. We only went out a handful of times or so. It wasn’t serious.”
He wanted to ask what she meant by serious—I-love-you serious or sleep-with-you serious?—but the elevator doors pinged open before he could.
“Here.” She handed him her keys then punched “Redial” on her phone and held it to her ear. “I’ll be just a minute. Go on in.”
He nodded as he moved toward the apartment’s door, but he couldn’t shake the strange feelings swirling inside him.
His life was exactly like Brent Coleman’s. Even down to the drinking and self-deprecation. The only difference was that he’d had parents and siblings who’d looked out for him. Brent Coleman hadn’t had that.
He moved into the apartment and closed the door behind him, dropping Raegan’s keys in the dish on the entry table. He didn’t want to end up like Coleman, bitter and alone. He didn’t want to look in the mirror one day and see half the man he used to be.
He blinked, looking at the purple walls around him, realizing he’d wandered into Emma’s room. His gaze strayed to the pink-and-white castle Raegan had painted above the bed when they’d learned that Emma was going to be a girl.
Pain lanced his chest. A pain that burned his eyes. A pain he knew he’d never be without. But one he didn’t have to struggle thro
ugh alone if he didn’t want to.
Footsteps sounded behind him, then a sharp intake of breath. Turning slowly, he spotted Raegan standing in the doorway, her cheeks pale, her eyes wide and filled with a thousand insecurities.
She lifted a hand and flipped the switch on the wall. Light from the ceiling fixture illuminated the bed, the dresser, and the toys neatly put away in the corner of the room. But all Alec saw was her.
“You’re probably wondering what this is,” she said hesitantly.
“I’m not.”
She looked over at the room, glancing, he realized, anywhere but at him. “I know you think it’s silly. And maybe it is, but I—”
“I don’t think it’s silly. I think it’s perfect. I want this in my house.” When her gaze slid to his, he added, “I want it in our house.”
“Ours?” she whispered.
“Yes, ours.” His heart raced as he stepped toward her, as he brushed the hair away from her bruised cheek and gazed down at her as if he were seeing her for the first time. It felt like he was. In the center of his soul. Where his heart seemed to be beating hard and strong for the first time in years. “I want a second chance, Raegan. I want our life back. I want you and any future kids we might have, and I want to find Emma. My life means nothing without you in it.”
Emotions played across her face as she looked up at him—fear, doubt, hope—but when her eyes grew damp and her lip quivered, he knew the strongest of those emotions was love. “I want those things too.” Lifting to her toes, she threw her arms around him and whispered, “I want all of them. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
His eyes slid closed, and he held her close, pressing his face against her neck and breathing in the sweet scent of her jasmine perfume. This was where he was supposed to be. With her. He’d spent the last three years trying not to feel anything, trying to convince himself that being numb was better than hurting, but it wasn’t. Numb was empty. Numb was Brent Coleman, waiting to die. Numb gave him no reason to live, and he wanted to live. He wanted to live with Raegan. He wanted to feel the highs and the lows. He even wanted to feel the pain because it meant he was human and real, not dead inside. As long as he was with her, he knew he could survive the pain. As long as they were together, he could survive anything.
Tears burned the backs of his eyes. Tears of regret, of sadness, of fear, but mostly of hope. A hope he felt because of her.
“I need you to know something.” He swallowed the lump in his throat, the words like sandpaper on his tongue. “I’m an addict. I was an addict before we met, and I’m always going to be an addict, even now when I’m sober. I can give you a hundred different reasons why, but the simplest is that it was available when I was very young. Gilbert never cared if I drank. He encouraged it, actually. And when you’re a kid, living in that kind of environment—” His chest grew tight. “It’s how I learned to cope with all the shit going on around me.”
She drew back and looked up with tear-filled eyes, and even though he just wanted to go on holding her so he didn’t have to see her face when he admitted his faults, he knew he owed her this. Owed her way more than he could ever give her.
He drew a deep breath for courage and looked down into her gorgeous green eyes. Focused on them and not the raw emotions clawing at his chest. “I hid it,” he said, closing his hands over hers and holding on to them for strength. “For a long time. After Michael and Hannah adopted me, I got caught at a few parties. They knew I drank now and then in high school, but I played off the fact all kids do it. I knew just what to say to reassure them it was no big deal. They didn’t know how much or how often I was drinking, though. My siblings didn’t really either. Ethan’s the only one who had any kind of idea, but he never even knew how bad it really was. Anytime he or anyone else would bring it up, I’d make a joke and laugh off their concern. I got through college okay because everyone drinks in college, but before you and I met, I was drinking way more than before. I blamed it on the job. On the travel for the AP, on the long hours and the things I was photographing and seeing in war-torn countries like Afghanistan and Ethiopia. And I told myself when I got home I’d be better. But I wasn’t. Not until I met you.”
His heart squeezed so tight, as if it were wringing all the lies and half-truths from inside him as he thought back to that night. Seeing her through his camera lens in the crowd. Being mesmerized by her beauty and self-confidence. Knowing he needed to be a part of that. Somehow. In any way he could.
“I didn’t want to just get by anymore,” he said. “I wanted to live. To let go of the past. To start fresh with you. So I cut way back. I told myself I could be a social drinker. We could go out with friends and I wouldn’t have to get loaded to have a good time. And I did have a good time. Anytime I was with you was the best time. But I was always thinking about having another drink. About stopping at the liquor store on the way home. About giving in to the urge and just letting go.”
“You never told me you thought about that.”
“I couldn’t. No addict can. It’s admitting your biggest weakness. I don’t think even I knew how bad it was until we lost Emma.”
She closed her eyes, and the pain he saw across her features hit him hard, right beneath the breastbone, right in his heart, which was already twisted into a knot. He squeezed her hands and forced himself to go on.
“I lost it then. I didn’t know how to deal with it all. I couldn’t look at you. I couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened or how it was all my fault—”
“What happened to Emma was not your fault.” Her eyes shot open, and this time when they focused on his, they weren’t sad or heartbroken; they were determined. As determined as he’d ever seen them. “It could have happened to me. It could have happened to your mother if she’d been watching Emma that day. Whoever took her had been waiting and watching for the right moment when we looked awa—”
“I know that.” God, he loved how she jumped to defend him. She’d done that before, when she’d had every reason to hate him, but he’d been so focused on his own pain and self-loathing then that he’d pushed her away. He didn’t want to do that anymore. He brushed a shaky finger down her soft cheek. “I know that now. But then . . . then I couldn’t face it. It hurt too much. So I did what I’d always done when things got to be too much. I had a drink. And another. And another, until I was numb to everything—the pain, the guilt. Especially you.”
She looked down at his shirtfront, and he knew she was remembering all those nights he’d stumbled in drunk when she’d stayed up worried because she hadn’t known where he was. All the times she’d needed to lean on him and he hadn’t been there for her. The arguments, the tears, all the heartache he’d put her through. And the way he’d walked away from her when he should have stayed and fought for her. For them.
His fingers shook as he brought her hands to his lips and kissed them. Lowering them so they rested on his chest, right over his heart, he forced himself to get it all out. “I know Ethan told you about the night he found me passed out on my kitchen table. That was a wake-up call for me. Not because I’d hit bottom or whatever, but because I saw what I was doing to my family. And through them, I saw what I’d done to you.”
He tightened his hands around hers, felt their warmth beneath his fingers, and knew he could do this no matter what she had to say when he was finished. “I hated myself for what I did to you. For how I treated you. And there hasn’t been a single day that I haven’t wanted to find you and tell you how sorry I am. But I couldn’t because I . . .” He searched for the right word. Knew there was only one. “Because I was scared. Scared that you’d slam the door in my face or walk away. Scared it would push me right back to the edge even though I deserved that kind of response from you. Scared, mostly, because I don’t know if I hit the very bottom that night or if there’s something worse out there waiting for me. All I know is that I don’t want to go there. I never want to go there again. I want you. I want us.” The tears he’d been fighting back t
hrough his whole admission filled his eyes. “I want everything back that I fucked up so badly because I’m weak.”
“Oh, Alec.” A tear slipped over her lash and slid down her bruised cheek. “You’re not weak.” She brushed her soft fingertips over the stubble on his jaw, her voice just as thick and raspy as his. “You’re stubborn. You’re hotheaded at times. And when you want something, there’s no stopping you. But you’re not weak.”
He closed his eyes and leaned into her touch, reveling in her comfort even as his own tears slipped free.
“A weak child couldn’t have survived the upbringing you did. A weak teenager wouldn’t have had the strength to testify against his father about all the horrible things that man made him do. And a weak adult could never stand here and tell me all the things you just did. I just wish you’d told me sooner. I wish . . .”
When her voice hitched, he opened his eyes and looked down at her. At the tears shimmering in her eyes, at the emotions playing over her face.
“I wish we hadn’t spent the last three years apart,” she whispered. “Because I would have been there with you through it all. I promised to love you through better or worse. Those weren’t just words for me. I meant them. I still mean them. I love you, Alec. I’ve always loved yo—”
Every emotion he’d kept locked inside for so damn long burst free. He let go of her hand still resting on his chest, framed her face, and captured her mouth with his. She groaned against him, held on to his arms, kissed him back until he was breathless. But it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough. He needed her to know he felt the same. Needed to show her. Needed to be with her now. Right now.
He dropped his hands to her waist and lifted her off the floor. She drew back from his mouth and gripped his shoulders. “What—?”
“Don’t let go of me.”
Her eyes darkened with understanding as he moved them both toward the hallway, and with another groan she lowered her mouth back to his and wrapped her legs around his waist, kissing him with such passion and heat and need, the blood pounded in his veins and pushed his desire for her past all sense of reason.
Gone (Deadly Secrets Book 2) Page 18